This broad flat valley of the Western Ausable, the stream winding through it in a deeply-cut gorge, and surrounded on the south and west by an amphitheatre of the highest Adirondack peaks, is the township of North Elba in Essex county; and the valley and its fertile borders are the "Plains of Abraham." It is a farming district, so well enclosed by the mountains that the soil is fairly tillable. These plains gradually slope northwestward to the banks of two of the most noted of the Adirondack waters, Lake Placid and the Mirror Lake, with old Whiteface Mountain for their guardian, "heaving high his forehead bare." Here are the scattered buildings of the village of North Elba on the plains, and the more modern and fashionable settlement beyond at the lakes. To the southward is the great rounded top of Tahawus, the highest Adirondack peak, displayed through an opening vista, and at the northern border grandly stands Whiteface, the black sides abruptly changing to white, where an avalanche years ago denuded the granite cliffs near the top and swept down all the trees. Here at North Elba was the home and farm of "Old John Brown of Osawatomie." He had been given this homestead by Gerrit Smith, the great New York Abolitionist, in 1849, and there had also been founded here a colony of refuge for the negro slaves. It was then a remote and almost unknown place in the wilderness. Brown settled in the colony and built his little log house and barn near a huge boulder which stood a short distance from the front door. Here he formed his plan for liberating the slaves, and from here went to engage in the Kansas border wars of 1856. Returning, for three years he brooded on plans to liberate the negroes, and after further conflicts in Kansas projected the expedition into Virginia for the capture of Harper's Ferry in October, 1859. He declared his object to be to free all the slaves, and that he acted "by the authority of God Almighty." After his capture and conviction he discouraged efforts at liberation, saying, "I am of more use to the cause dead than living." After his death his body was brought up here to his home in the wilderness, for he had said, "When I die, bury me by the big rock, where I love to sit and read the word of God." Here he was buried on a bitterly cold day in December, 1859, a few sorrowing friends conducting the services and covering up his body in the frozen ground.

The old gravestone of his grandfather was brought from New England and put at the head of the grave, but it was soon so chipped off and broken by relic-hunters, it had to be enclosed in a case for preservation. Behind the grave rises the huge boulder on which has been carved, in large letters, "John Brown, 1859." The old gravestone is full of names both front and back, containing the record of his own death, and that of three sons, two losing their lives at Harper's Ferry and one in Kansas. The record of his life, graven on the stone, is: "John Brown, born May 9, 1800, was executed at Charleston, Va., Dec. 2, 1859." It is here that

"John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave,

And his soul goes marching on."

Forty years afterwards, in 1899, the remains of seven of his companions in the Harper's Ferry raid were removed here and interred beside him. This region no longer knows Brown's kindred, for all have disappeared. Yet in the world's mutations, nothing could be more strange than that this remote wilderness, originally selected as a refuge and hiding-place for runaway slaves, should have become one of the most fashionable and popular health resorts in America. The farm and graves are now kept by New York State as a public park.

LAKE PLACID TO PAUL SMITH'S.

Lake Placid, nestling at the base of old Whiteface and elevated eighteen hundred and sixty feet above the sea, is often called the "Eye of the Adirondacks." Its mountain environment has made it almost a rectangle, four miles long and two miles wide. Down its centre, arranged in a row, are three beautiful islands, named respectively the Hawk, Moose and Buck, two being large and high and the third smaller. These divide it into alternating spaces of land and water much like a chess-board. To the eastward is the pretty Mirror Lake, about three miles in circuit. Both lakes have high wooded shores, and around them are gathered the hotels, cottages and camps of a large summer settlement. Surrounded by a grander galaxy of finer and higher mountains than any other lakes of this region, here is truly the "Eye" that views these dark Adirondacks in all their glory. These mountains are all sombre, and some almost inky black; many are hazy in the distance. To the northeast the Wilmington Pass, alongside Whiteface, lets out the western branch of Ausable; to the southward, the Indian Pass opening between McIntyre and Wallface is a source of the Hudson; to the westward, on the spurs of lower ranges, are the forests separating these lakes from the Saranacs. There are more than a hundred peaks around, of varying heights and features, among them the greatest of the Adirondacks. Embosomed within this wonderful amphitheatre is the glassy-surfaced lake, protected from the winds and storms, which is so attractive and so peaceful that it fully deserves its name, Lake Placid.

Crossing again to the westward through the forests and over the ridges, we come into the valley of the Saranac, with its lakes, and the ancient village of Harrietstown under the long ridge of Ampersand Mountain. Here on the Lower Saranac Lake is another summer settlement of villas, hotels and camps. Behind the mountain there is a little lake out of which flows a stream so crooked and twisted into and out of itself, turning around sweeping circles without accomplishing much progress, that its discoverers could not liken it to anything more appropriate than to the eccentric supernumerary of the alphabet, the "&." Thus the name of the "Ampersand" of the old spelling-books was applied first to the stream, and then to the lake and mountain, the latter being the guardian of the many lakes of this region. The Lower Saranac Lake is at fifteen hundred and forty feet elevation, and the Ampersand Mountain rises a thousand feet above it. A pretty church in the village is appropriately named for St. Luke the Physician, and here is located the Adirondack Sanitarium, this district being a favorite refuge for consumptives. The Chateaugay railroad comes in here, but the district beyond to the south and west has neither railroads nor wagon roads. It is such a labyrinth of lakes and water courses it can only be traversed in boats.

The whole western part of the Adirondacks is an elevated tableland, containing many hills and peaks, but saturated by water ways. Therefore "canoeing and carrying" is the method of transportation. The Lower Saranac Lake is five miles long, and beyond it is Round Lake, over two miles in diameter, beyond that being the Upper Saranac Lake, nearly eight miles long and dotted with islands. There are portages between them where the canoes have to be carried. The outlet of the Upper Saranac is a magnificent cataract and rapid, descending thirty-five feet in a distance of about one hundred yards. From the Upper Saranac Lake other portages, or "carrys," as they are called, lead over to the Blue Mountain region, the Raquette River and the Tupper Lakes to the westward. The Adirondack ranges here are lower, and the forests get denser, but all about are dotted the summer settlements, some of them displaying most elaborate construction. Every place has its boat-house and canoe-rack, and boats are moving in all directions. At the head of the Upper Saranac is St. Regis Mountain, and a long "carry" of about four miles through the forest goes over to the Big Clear Pond, the head of the Saranac system of waters. Crossing this lake, yet another "carry" takes us over the watershed. This is a famous portage in the liquid district, the "St. Germain carry" of over a mile between the Saranac headwaters and the sources of St. Regis River, flowing out westward and then northward to the St. Lawrence. It leads to the series of St. Regis Lakes, and finally on the bank of the Lower St. Regis to the great hotel of the woods—Paul Smith's—with many camps surrounding the shores of the lake. Apollus Smith, a shrewd Yankee, came here many years ago, when the locality was an unbroken wilderness, and built a small log house in the forest as an abiding-place for the hunter and angler. It was repeatedly enlarged, and with it the domain, now covering several thousand acres, until the hostelrie has become an unique mixture of the backwoods with modern fashion, and is everywhere known as the typical house of the Adirondack region. Upon the hill behind the hotel is the attractive little church of "St. John in the Wilderness," appropriately built of logs hewn in the surrounding forest.

ADIRONDACK LAKES.